Gardening Tips

Expert ideas for beautiful gardens

Our friends at Ocado are more green fingered than we ever imagined! Here they’ve teamed up with gardening guru Veronica Peerless to give us the top 10 in gardening essentials. There’s hope for even then palest green thumbs.

COMPOST

A decent multi-purpose compost id fine for most of your gardening needs, including plants in pots. But if you’re sowing lots of seeds, consider a seed compost – it’s lower in nutrients and has a finer consistency. If you prefer not to use peat, there are plenty of peat-free options. And if, like me, you don’t have a car, getting heavy bags of compost and bulky tools delivered directly to your door is a godsend.

West+Multi-Purpose Compost & 4 Month Feed 10L £2.99 (30p per 100g)

SEEDS

It’s time start thinking about ordering and sowing seeds. If you’re new to growing veg, start with chillies, runner beans or peas. Shallots are a gourmet crop that’s simple to grow. Plant a few ‘sets’ (immature bulbs) and you’ll have lots of bulbs in a just few months.

Mr Fothergill’s Seeds – Pea Onward £2.45

TOOLS

You’ll need a couple of indispensible tools to get you started in the garden: a trowel for digging holes and transplanting plants; and a hand fork for breaking into soil and weeding. Invest in a decent kit – poor quality tools can buckle under pressure.

Burgon & Ball Soft Pink Hand Tool Set £19.95

PRUNERS

A decent pair of pruners (secateurs) is a ‘must-have’ for any gardener – stick them in your back pocket and whip them out for deadheading or light pruning. A bypass pair (with two blades, like a pair of scissors) is suitable for most gardening jobs. If you’ve got lots of woody stems to cut, an anvil pair (with one blade that closes onto a flat surface) is a better option. If you’ve got lots of thick stems to prune, you’ll be better off choosing a pair of loppers, which are more heavy duty.

Fiskars Inspiration Bypass Pruner Viola £14.99

SLUG PELLETS

The UK’s monsoon summer or 2012 brought out armies of slugs and snails, and they won’t be going away in 2013. Protect your plants as soon as you plant them. Pellets containing ferric phosphate are suitable for organic gardeners. Most of us tend to scatter too many, so please read the label.

Eraza Slug & Snail Pellets 1kg £4.49

A GOOD BOOK

You can find the answer to most things online these days, but beware of gardeners’ forums – sometimes the advice from other gardeners isn’t entirely correct. Often there’s no substitution for a good gardening book. Treat yourself to a recently published book as pests, diseases and plant varieties change all the time.

RHS Complete Gardener’s Manual £20

A MEADOW MIX

The meadowy, naturalistic planting at East London’s Olympic Park was much admired in 2012, and it’s really easy to emulate in your own garden. Gro Sure Flower Seeds contain a convenient mix of seeds, granular compost and feed.

Westland Gro Sure Easy Flowers – Pastel Mix 1.5kg £7.99

VEG BAGS

There are few things more gratifying than digging up your own spuds, and they grow brilliantly in large pots or bags. Just pop a couple of chitted (sprouted) seed potatoes into a half-filled pot, water regularly and keep covering the emerging shoots with compost. Salads are great in bags too – they’re easier to keep safe from slugs and snails.

Burgon & Ball XL Vegetable Planting Bag £8.95

GLOVES

Lots of gardeners love to get their hands dirty, but if you don’t like the feeling of soil under your fingernails, let your gloves get dirty instead. Go for a pair that are as thin and tight fitting as possible, if you’re handling seeds or small plants, and a more bulky pair for heavier jobs.

Learning to garden is a great way to encourage kids’ enthusiasm for food. You’ll find a lovely range of children’s gardening products at Ocado, including a Grow My First Ever Tomato Kit, mini tools, wellies and watering cans. Go on, let them get messy outdoors.

PASS IT ON – SAVE TIME AND MONEY, HAVE IT DELIVEREDMake life easy, all the items on this page and more are available to order online at Ocado

Sweet peas make a gorgeous summer display,with support from bamboo canes of an obelisk support,easy and cheap to grow from seeds,, after flowering de head flowers,to get plenty more blooms, near the end of September leave some flower heads on to grow to seeds , for free seeds for next year,

A decent pair of pruners (secateurs) is a ‘must-have’ for any gardener – stick them in your back pocket and whip them out for deadheading or light pruning. A bypass pair (with two blades, like a pair of scissors) is suitable for most gardening jobs. If you’ve got lots of woody stems to cut, an anvil pair (with one blade that closes onto a flat surface) is a better option. If you’ve got lots of thick stems to pru

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